I love participating as a subject in user studies, focus groups and interviews. This affords me the opportunity to witness social science from an entirely new perspective. Last nite, i had the opportunity to be in a focus group on blogging. The focus group consisted of 5 (technologically savvy) subjects plus the moderator and it took place over AIM. I’ve participated in interviews over AIM and found them incessantly irritating, so i was quite curious to see what would happen in a focus group.

We were all assigned random logins. This meant that no one took the time to personalize them and thus, there were a lot of little AIM men talking. Because i was using iChat, i couldn’t differentiate the AIM men and i found this consistently confusing. [Update: smarter people taught me how to switch to see names because of this post.] Nothing was known of the participants, although aspects of their interests and values emerged through conversation. Of course, the problem was that i couldn’t differentiate the speakers so i’d learn something about one AIM man and not know how to connect it back to that AIM man when the s/he spoke again. Very confusing. Thus, i tried not to model gender or other attributes in my head and just stick to text, line by line. This made it feel very un-focus group-y.

The questions came as fast as they did in the interview and so i found myself scrolling fast trying to keep up. I also found that i did not like the text i was producing. Instead of trying to flesh out nuance, i answered every question as briefly as possible, with lots of information left to interpolation. Still, we were producing so much data that it was hard to keep up. Yet, what was that data worth? I don’t think that i answered any question well or properly contextualized anything. Still, i rambled on with stories and little anecdotes, hoping those would help.

To a certain degree, we bounced things off each other, but group gestures of affirmation and confusion were completely missing. Most everyone was focused on getting their text out as fast as possible.

The result was pretty frustrating. Of course, i think that my experience on that AIM chat mimics one of my subject’s descriptions of blogging better than blogging itself:

“You’re basically standing on a soapbox and reading something out loud only with a blog it feels like there’s a big community square and everyone’s got a soapbox and they’re about the same height and everyone’s reading at the same time.”

I have 741 books in my room. Paper. Almost all used from the beginning. I have obsessively documented them in Excel (although i twitch with excitement over the possibilities every time Marc Smith appears with his little barcode reader/Aura). I love lending my books to people, provided that they follow my neurotic rules (particularly: no removing of any object found inserted into book and please insert some sort of tender love and attention… strawberry jam is fine).

When i started listening to Audible.com, i professed my love and convinced all of my friends that this was the best thing since sliced bread. I rave about a book that i read or tell a friend that they must read it. Then, the inevitable horror comes. They ask, simply and politely, may i borrow it? I turn bright red, lower my eyes and mumble apologies, stammering out that i can’t… that the technology forbids me… that fair use is dead… digital first sale requires that i sell the whole book collection, not just the one… aa files can’t be transferred…

It sucks, really. What the hell is the use of a book that you can’t lend? I’m completely devastated. My role of friendly hub librarian is being destroyed by technology. The joy i give people by lending my books is being replaced by embarrassment. I find myself stifling any speech about the books i read on Audible, not wanting to face the inevitable interaction. Will all the lenders in the world find their positions in the social stratosphere usurped by capitalists?

Why can’t i just have the digital equivalent to my little Excel file that says “lent to XX”? Why can’t i just be forced to re-acquire the book before lending it out again? I do this all the time (or i’m forced to buy a new copy myself… i’m on copy #17 of Stone Butch Blues). I want a lending solution for digital technology damnit!

I find it hard to tell you
Cause I find it hard to take
When people run in circles
It’s a mad world

Incessant repetition is infinitely entertaining for children and sleep-deprived, hallucinating workaholic adults. Thus, it gave me much joy to re-introduce the badgers to my friends this weekend. In turn, they introduced me to the morbidity of salad fingers.

Sometimes, finding absurdity is the only way to cope when life gets peculiar.

CALL FOR PAPERS

FLAIRS-05, Clearwater Beach, Florida, USA
May 16-18, 2005
Special track on
“AI for Social Networks, Social Networks in AI”

You will find at http://www-poleia.lip6.fr/~brezil/FLAIRS-05 the presentation of the special track entitled “AI for Social Networks, Social Networks in AI” at the conference of the Florida Artificial Intelligence Research Society.

The goal of the Special Track on “AI for Social Networks, Social Networks in AI” is to attempt to fill a gap between AI and Social Networks. We are seeking submissions of papers that describe original results addressing issues such as (but not limited to) the following:

* Where can AI tools bring a new dimension in social networks?
* What needs can we identify in social networks that resonate with AI?
* What AI tools exist for which problems in social networks?
* How studies on social networks can enlighten AI problems?
* Is it an interest for AI-mediated social networks?
* Are there some social-network oriented AI approaches?

Please note that the deadline for submission is October 22, 2004.

The baby of Michele Chang and Elizabeth Goodman, formally known as fiasco has finally been fully born. Please welcome Digital Street Game into this world!

Digital Street Game is a hybrid game of misadventure set on the streets of New York. It’s a battle for turf, a contest of wills – in short – an excuse to explore the city.

Players compete for turf by performing and documenting “stunts” on the physical streets of New York in order to claim territory on a virtual map. Stunts are comprised of a random combination of 3 elements: 1) an object commonly found in the city (e.g. bodega) 2) a street game (e.g. stickball) and 3) a wildcard/urban situation (e.g. happy hour). Players interpret these elements as they wish, then stage and photograph their stunt in order to claim a spot on the map. The more stunts players perform the more turf they claim. But of course some players may want to compete for the same territory. In order to hold on to territory, players’ stunts must score high with the rest of the game community.